


Shackles

by TheRantDragon



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Criminals, Criminal Beginnings, F/M, Fluff and Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 14:32:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12110784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheRantDragon/pseuds/TheRantDragon
Summary: “If you hadn’t blown me up I’d be sitting pretty with that suh-weet piece of tech!” He said it with nothing short of rapturous longing dripping from his voice, and it wasn’t hard for her to figure out that he’d probably been dreaming and scheming about such a heist for a long time; and maybe it figured, right? Any aspiring embezzler would jump at the chance to snag something important enough to make the headlines, and what could have been more appealing than the loudly crowed about STAR Labs breakthrough in microtechnology?





	Shackles

**Author's Note:**

> This is old, it was a drabble I did quite some time back that I liked and then re-vamped and forgot to ever post anywhere besides Tumblr. I still have a huge soft spot for it and there's a part of me that's super interested in the idea of continuing... if I weren't in such a writing rut that's been going about two years strong or more. Oh well.
> 
> I always credit my use of Velocity!Wally to IronicVeghead! 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

The steady hum of the armored vehicle filled her with a strange sort of comfort, despite the seeming severity of her current predicament. It was dark in the enclosed space she sat in, with only a sliver of evening light penetrating through the small, barred rectangle that offered a glimpse of the towering buildings of Star City as they whizzed past. Mentally, she took stock of every street sign she could, every landmark that told her they were fast leaving the main drag and heading into downtown.

_ That was Sixth. I’ve got about fifteen minutes, tops,  _ Artemis thought, tearing her stormy gaze away from the window and back to the thick cuffs that held her wrists together. A bobby pin twisted between her lithe, calloused fingers; she had discretely plucked it from her hair shortly after she’d been unceremoniously chucked inside like a sack of flour, and she couldn’t help but smirk smugly as she worked expertly away at the lock.  _ Amateurs. They called that a pat down? _

Oh well. Their fuck up was going to be her salvation. She just needed a few more minutes of quiet concentration and--

“This is all your fault, you know,” a bitter, accusing voice spat at her from across the van. She glanced up from her work; oh, right. The whole reason she was in this situation to begin with.

He was a boy of about her age, a speedster, with flaming red hair and freckles that dotted the expanse of his cheeks like droplets of paint scattered across the canvas of his pale skin. They clustered sparingly along the bridge of his currently wrinkled nose and disappeared down into his neckline, which was hanging away from his body as he leaned forward on his knees to gaze at her with blame burning in his emerald eyes.  She tore her eyes away from the opening in his shirt (how far down did those silly things  _ go _ ?) and locked them unflinchingly on his own, hoping the force of her glare might overpower his own; it was no use, though, they seemed to be evenly matched.

“How do you figure?” Artemis challenged, forgetting all about her attempted lock-picking out of genuine curiosity. How, exactly, did this amateur think anything that had happened back in that lab was somehow to be pinned on her?

_ This ought to be good _ , she thought sarcastically as he opened his mouth.

“If you hadn’t blown me up I’d be sitting pretty with that  _ suh-weet  _ piece of tech!” He said it with nothing short of rapturous longing dripping from his voice, and it wasn’t hard for her to figure out that he’d probably been dreaming and scheming about such a heist for a long time; and maybe it figured, right? Any aspiring embezzler would jump at the chance to snag something important enough to make the headlines, and what could have been more appealing than the loudly crowed about STAR Labs breakthrough in microtechnology?

_ And it really couldn’t be more obvious that you’re new to this game, speedy, _ Artemis thought almost fondly, because she could remember how naive she’d been the first time she’d flown solo without Jade; she liked to think she’d come out with a bit more of her dignity in tact than this guy, though.  _ You’re cute, in a clumsy beginner kind of way, but I so don’t have time for this. _

Outwardly, Artemis simply snorted and went back to her subtle lock-picking. “I didn’t blow you up, you ran straight into my line of sight. Don’t blame others for you mistakes, kid.” It was strange to call someone her own age “kid”, but it was hard to see someone so green as anything but.

Predictably, he didn’t take kindly to her words. 

“The  _ name  _ is Velocity!” the speedster snapped, his hands clenching into fists within the shackles that surrounded his wrists. “And I fail to see how it’s my fault that I ran into a complete  _ noobie  _ on her first heist!”

Artemis couldn’t help it: she burst into laughter. The throaty sound of it bounced off the walls of the enclosed space and made the redhead sit up a little in surprise, his eyebrows rising dangerously close to his ruffled hairline. The look lasted for only a moment before it turned into an indignant scowl, almost as if it had taken him that long to figure out that she was laughing at  _ him _ \-- it made her laugh a little harder.

“I fail to see what’s so funny about this!” Velocity groused as she composed herself. Artemis leveled him with a superior looking smirk that she could practically  _ feel  _ digging underneath his skin. Good.

“Look, I don’t know who you think _ I  _ am, but I think we both know which of us looks more like their mom dressed them for this heist,” Artemis said pointedly, following up the jab with a smooth flick of her stormy eyes from his head down to his scuffed sneaker clad feet. He flushed noticeably underneath her calculating gaze, and it gave her far more satisfaction than it probably should have; she knew she was being a bit petty, but  _ he  _ was the one slinging rookie insults at a girl that had been trained to steal and kill since she could walk. He, on the other hand, was so obviously fresh off the block that it was nearly painful to look at. He was dressed in a pair of faded dark blue jeans and a ratty black shirt that looked like it had seen better days, and prior to their capture he’d also sported a face mask and a pair of admittedly impressive high-tech goggles.

In fact, those goggles had been the only thing he’d had going for him, and now that they were gone he just looked like an average teenager that had decided to go through an edgy phase of rebellion and bit off more than he could chew. Artemis was positive she hadn’t dressed so pathetically for the job since she’d been an overly eager ten year old trailing after Jade like she held up the moon and stars.

“Hey, not all of us live right next to Ninjas’R’Us, blondie!” the speedster shot back, his eyes mimicking the movements hers had made over his body. She was, of course, dressed impeccably for flitting through the dark shadows; black from head to toe, sleek and tight in all the places it really needed to be, perhaps in some places it didn’t. Velocity sure seemed to notice, because Artemis didn’t miss the way his eyes flicked more than once along her form, a soft half smirk of appreciation quirking the edge of his split lip before he remembered himself and caught her eye again, brows furrowing. But she had seen, and he wasn’t exactly so bad looking himself, clothing choice aside; maybe if he weren’t such a colossal klutzy loser she’d have deemed to take him with her when she escaped the back of the truck.

Artemis let out a soft tutting sound and went back to work on her handcuffs; bantering back and forth with him wasn’t going to get her ass any farther away from jail, only action would. She thought she heard the speedster mumble something under his breath as he settled back against the cold, humming metal wall behind him, and for a short moment she was able to fully concentrate on her lock, which was pretty close to being picked.

“Anyway,” Velocity said loudly out of the blue, causing Artemis to look up in surprise, and his demeanor looked so relaxed that if he hadn’t had his hands cuffed together she highly suspected he’d have them cushioning the back of his skull lazily. What was his  _ deal? _ “None of this matters anyway. My friends’ll have me out of this mess before we even get to the station. Don’t know if I can say the same for you, though, Blondie.”

Artemis stared at him as if he’d grown a second head, the gears in her head turning.

“You’ve got a funny way of addressing your back-up there, Viscosity,” she settled for saying, giving him an unimpressed sneer. 

“It’s Ve-loc-i-ty,” he enunciated slowly, as if educating a five year-old that he had grown particularly impatient with. “And no, I don’t. They’re not back-up, they’re my friends.” He stated it matter-of-factly, expression completely serious; she could find no hint of amusement or sarcasm in the crease of his brows, nor the downturn of his split lips. Just how many  _ more  _ ways could this Velocity guy prove to her that he was still wet around the ears?

“Don’t know if you got the memo when you signed up for breaking the law just because it seemed cool and edgy, fleet feet, but you don’t  _ have  _ friends anymore,” Artemis informed him unerringly, letting her grey eyes drop back down to the bobby pin with a sneer tugging her lips. She could feel him watching her, his gaze lingering on her thin, dark fingers as she worked with precision. “No one is your friend; whatever organization you work for,  _ whoever  _ you work for-- they don’t care about how you feel, or whether you come back alive, or having a round of drinks while you laugh and pat each other’s backs after a heist. Criminals have  _ back-up _ if they’re lucky, someone that  _ might  _ be interested enough in whatever it is you’re after to come bail your ass out, or at least show-up to pry it from your cold, dead fingers.” Artemis looked up at him, daring him to challenge her words, and found that he was gazing back at her steadily, a wrinkle between his pinched brows. She let out a scoff and returned to her work, letting the words she’d had drilled into her skull since she could walk fall dutifully from her lips. “In this world, it’s every girl for herself.”

Silence, for a beat.

Then a prominent “Ttt” sound came from Velocity and he shifted, no doubt leaning back against the wall casually.

“Says you.”

_ Ugh _ . Artemis couldn’t stop her eyes from rolling at his superior attitude, but she didn’t have anymore time to waste on arguing with him, especially not when she realized that they were rapidly approaching their destination.  _ There goes Tenth. Don’t let Freckles distract you anymore or you’ll pay for it. _

For a few blessed moments the wannabe criminal remained silent, and the only sounds that filled the space of the van were their grunts of discomfort each time the tires ran roughly against a pothole and bounced them both lightly off their hard metal benches. 

“God, I hate these things,” Velocity murmured suddenly, and the archer twitched her gaze up in time to see his fingers tugging at the uncomfortable weight of the inhibitor collar around his neck. She hadn’t been outfitted with one yet, due to her lack of powers, but she could sympathize with him; she’d felt the cold steel of one around her neck before and suspected that once they were carted off to Belle Reve or wherever, she’d feel the same icy grip as he. She figured it was a lot less horrible for her, though; she couldn’t imagine what having your powers, a very part of who you were, completely and utterly suppressed must feel like. She tossed him a sympathetic look, despite herself.

“They’re the worst,” she agreed.

He shot her something of a half-smile, then seemed to catch himself and went back to being stony and silent.

Whatever. 

They were nearing Twelfth before Velocity spoke again; Artemis had nearly gotten through her handcuffs, but something about his irritating voice just drew her attention like a magnet, and she put the final turns of her bobby pin on hold to look at him.

“You  _ might  _ want to brace yourself, babe,” the speedster advised smugly, a huge grin spreading across his features. There was no time for her to retort hotly at his use of the pet name, only to register the way he flattened himself as firmly against the steel wall as he possibly could.

_ Uh oh. _

There was an explosion that originated somewhere outside of the armored vehicle; a gasp ripped from Artemis’s throat as the rear-end of the van lifted up, flinging her out of her seat, and then it was pure chaos. The archer’s entire world was turned upside down as she was tossed about over and over again like a load of laundry set to tumble; the crunch of metal and the breaking of glass, the yells of the drivers somewhere up-front all combining into a hellish cacophony of noise that made her brains feel scrambled. Her shoulder hit the wall hard and she cried out, knowing she’d have an ugly bruise for it.

Then, finally, mercifully, it all stopped.

Artemis groaned, gritting her teeth and hissing as pain lanced through her limbs and her forehead; when she opened her eyes, she could only see in double, the image of vibrant green eyes repeating and swimming disorientingly for several seconds before settling on a single pair of wide orbs mere inches from her own. 

“ _ Fuck… _ ” Velocity moaned, his hot breath ghosting over her lips due to their proximity.  His back was braced against what had once been a side of the van, but was now serving as the floor, and she’d landed right on top of him, which explained why her skull felt like it was cracked straight down the middle. He groaned and shifted, trying to move, but his hands were still bound and she was a heavy weight on top of him. The only thing he succeeded in doing was drawing his attention to her closeness, and she saw a red tinge bleed across the surface of his cheeks as he attempted to draw his head back to get some space between them. “Not that I haven’t dreamed about being in this kind of position with a hot babe, but I think I can safely say you don’t quite fit the bill, Blondie.”

Artemis tutted at his words, grunting as she worked to maneuver her hands into a position where she could push off of his chest. It was hard work, given the awful pain in her shoulder and the heavy manacles clasping her wrists together, but she finally got herself in the right position, though not without managing to brush their noses together. 

“Not even in your dreams,  _ Viscosity _ ,” Artemis sneered, hands on his chest, her thighs straddling his hips.

And that was when the back door of the van fell open.

“Woah, didn’t know things were so cozy in here or I would have just left you two alone, Velocity!” came a highly amused voice.

_ “Dude!” _

Artemis scoffed and unnecessarily pushed her palm roughly against the side of Velocity’s face so that she could get to her feet. She refused to acknowledge the color she could feel in her own cheeks, instead opting to step over the speedster and beyond the lip of the truck’s entrance. The black haired boy that had seemingly given them freedom popped up next to her, some sort of lock pick extending from one of his gloves; at least  _ this  _ kid looked and dressed like he knew what he was doing.

“Would you like me to remove those, madame?” he asked with a grin behind his dark sunglasses.

Not quite knowing what to make of the strange kid, she shot him a skeptical once-over before replying,“Thanks but no thanks,” coolly, and easily pried her hands free of the cuffs she had been working on since they’d been thrown into the van. She hadn’t quite finished picking them when the van exploded, but she’d been close enough to success that one good slam of her wrists against the metal wall during the resulting tumbling had been enough to loosen them completely. It wasn’t exactly how she’d have prefered to get free, but she wasn’t going to look a (violent)gifthorse in the mouth. Artemis dropped the cuffs carelessly and spent a moment rubbing the feeling back into her wrists while Shades went to free Velocity from his own bindings.

While the boys were occupied, the archer moved around to the front of the truck and yanked open the front door. The driver and passenger were both unconscious, and she pulled the man closest out of the car and dumped him with little care onto the asphalt before searching the cabin for what she was looking for. A moment later she came back around the truck, adjusting the straps of her quiver and checking her beloved bow over for any damage.

Velocity was speaking when she got back.

“–all I’m saying is we could go back and–”

“Hey, Viscosity,” Artemis called. “Catch.”

The redhead deftly caught the high-tech goggles she tossed his way, looking down at them dumbly for a moment. And she’d only returned them to him because they’d been right next to her quiver anyway, and really, it was the  _ only  _ thing he had going for him and she’d just feel sorry for him if he lost them.

“Uh… thanks?” he said slowly, putting them back on his forehead. Then, with a scowl, he added, “And it’s  _ Velocity _ !”

Shades cackled. Artemis just shrugged and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Whatever. And I wouldn’t bother going back to Star Labs if I were you.”

“And why not?” Velocity demanded. “So you can go back for yourself instead? I don’t think so, Blondie. We– what’s  _ that _ ?” he spluttered suddenly; while he’d been blabbering, Artemis had reached behind her and pressed a small button near the bottom of her quiver, and into her palm had dropped the coveted Star Labs microchip, which she had stashed inside of a secret compartment at the base while Velocity had unwittingly provided a distraction.

It had turned out he was good from something after all.

Artemis grinned triumphantly, holding it between her thumb and forefinger.

“I think you boys will find the one back at Star Labs to be a  _ bit  _ disappointing,” she said. Velocity’s mouth dropped open; Shades cackled louder than ever. In their momentary stupefaction, Artemis quickly stashed the microchip into one of her belt pouches, then drew one of her grappling arrows and shot it expertly into one of the tall buildings that flanked them on either side of the street.

She cast one last glance back at them.

“See you around, _ Viscosity _ ,” she drawled out insultingly, and shot them both a mocking salute with two of her fingers. “It’s been fun.”

And she reeled herself up onto the top of the building, Shade’s cackling and the speedster’s loud indignation in her ears as she began to bound away across the rooftops, grinning.

_ “It’s Velocity!” _


End file.
